Trump wants Putin to win

It is meet, right and our bounden duty to begin any column about Ukraine with a vigorous expression of the columnist’s distaste for the President and Vice-President of the United States. Consider that done. Donald Trump is a slob, a bully and a liar: a person of low character. J.D. Vance is a nasty and morally confused little snake: a thug’s venomous sidekick.

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It is also an appropriate preliminary courtesy to state without hesitation that Volodymyr Zelensky is a brave and inspirational warrior whose personal qualities set his country firmly on the path of resistance to an unprovoked attack. Done.

And, finally, it is necessary if superfluous to repeat that Vladimir Putin is a monstrous despot whose fantasies about regaining his country’s imperial sway endanger all his neighbours. Utterly untrustworthy, President Putin is a cold-blooded visionary.

So there. Having said what goes without saying, may we proceed?

I’m beginning to wonder whether Zelensky is becoming a bit of a problem, and Trump’s unintending accomplice in the side-lining of Ukraine from negotiations. A negotiation is taking place between Ukraine’s principal military sponsor, the United States, and Ukraine’s aggressor, the Russian Federation. By shouting from the wings that Ukraine should have a veto in these negotiations, and implying that he’d find any ‘land for peace’ compromise unacceptable, he lends weight to Trump’s insistence that in the end, he and Putin must decide. Zelensky thus undermines his country’s core interests.

Three questions. What are Ukraine’s core interests? What can we guess about Russia’s bottom line? And is there any limit to Trump’s seeming acquiescence to Putin’s demands?

My week in Ukraine in February last year taught me something I’m not sure we’ve quite absorbed in commentary here at home.